Life After Superheroes

There was a strange lack of joy at this year's Comic-Con. The rooms were a little smaller, and the major studios were harder to find. More importantly, for the first time in a long time, people — real people, at least, which is to say those not in costume — weren't really talking about big, new comic-book movies. Sure, there were the glimpses of The Amazing Spider-Man reboot and Emma Stone to go with them, but otherwise it was business as usual: the premiere of Cowboys & Aliens, Robert Rodriguez mouthing off about whatever he happens to be into at the moment — not a lot anybody with an Internet connection and a penchant for blockbusters hadn't already seen or cared much about.

It was a hangover, of sorts, for an industry that has pretty much exhausted itself on its own stamina and impossible hype. Last year was a record year for the teaser: The Green Lantern, Scott Pilgrim vs. the World, next year's The Avengers, and more projects that either still haven't materialized or didn't compel too many average moviegoers to actually go out and see them. Those failures — not to mention the fact that Disney, in its recent deal, has stolen some thunder from Marvel — have put the convention, if not the movie business, in an awkward position: A lot of people are trying desperately to change the conversation away from just about anything superhero-related.

Which might not be all bad. Though it was short on capes, last weekend did bring out a few heavy hitters, like Ridley Scott and Steven Spielberg, who were as excited as they'd ever been to talk about their own projects, which had little to do with the franchise blitz we've come to know. With some old Hollywood craftsmen back in the room, there was even a little nostalgia, however faint, for people who remember what it was like to step into a theater in 1982. And that feels good.

It's hard to argue that this is a bad time for the American superhero movie. In fact, the opposite is true: It's never been better. There are five in this summer's lineup alone, compared with two last year and one the year before. Last week's Captain America: The First Avenger was a huge commercial and critical success, beating out the unbeatable Harry Potter, which bodes well for what's to come. "They aren't Dark Knight numbers, but for Marvel in particular it's an incredibly promising precursor to next summer's Avengers," says Joey Esposito, the comics editor at IGN.com. "[That's] going to be the game-changer. It was a big risk on Marvel's part, and it'll likely redefine the scope of superhero films."

Okay, but that raises a possibly more important question: What happens after The Avengers, or Christopher Nolan's third and final Batman movie — after we've seen all there is to see of the best comic-book blockbusters ever made? It's hard not to feel like all of us, especially those of us scattered outside the conventions centers of San Diego, are getting a little winded from the sheer pace of output. It's hard to remember, but Spider-Man 3 only came out four years ago — is it really already time to put Andrew Garfield in a suit and call him Peter Parker? Zack Snyder's Man of Steel will no doubt be the biggest and baddest Superman yet, but, five years after Bryan Singer's romanticized take on the story, do you really want to watch it? If you sat through the masturbatory spectacle of Sucker Punch, you might not be so thrilled to find out.

(1978) Everett Collection; (2006) Warner Bros.; (2011) FilmMagic

Our national re-obsession with superheroes can be traced back to 2000, around the same time CGI became just good enough to keep up with the metaphysical impossibilities of the source material. It was genuinely exciting to see an X-Men in theaters for the first time, and not just because Rebecca Romijn happened to be wearing blue body paint. The same was true of Sam Raimi's Spider-Man, a real auteur's distillation of graphic-novel mythology. These really were comic books as we'd never seen them before, and the bar, for visual if not narrative or emotional impact, has been set progressively higher each summer season. And by the time Spider-Man 3 came out, the backlash had started. Peter Parker, sprawled out in front of a giant American flag, became an icon for our total investment in the genre. We were ready for something else.

Now, we're certainly not done with the superhero, and given the form's deep history, we might never be. But suddenly there are a whole lot of other things to get excited about at the cineplex, even in July. No one — not even J.J. Abrams — dared to spend half as much money making Super 8 as The Green Lantern, and yet, with a real sense of Spielbergian mystery and good word-of-mouth, it became a modest success. There are other nods to that kind of retro science-fiction in next year's Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter and Looper, starring Joseph Gordon-Levitt, about a hitman who kills people from the future, which sounds like it should star an '80s-era Arnold Schwarzenegger, but still: They play with comic-book ideas without being comic books. And that doesn't just feel good so much as wholly necessary.

The most exciting things to come out of this year's Comic-Con, in fact, have nothing to do with superheroes. Like the images from Ridley Scott's Prometheus, also out next year, a spaceship thriller that's only sort of related to his Alien movies. What's most surprising about the released footage is how stripped-down it looks: a lot of black-and-white, humans with flashlights fumbling through the dark. It's pretty much the opposite of what we've come to expect from the summer-movie aesthetic — the overwhelming CGI of everything from Watchmen to The Green Lantern to... Christ, do you remember how bad Watchmen was? Those super-sized visuals grew up alongside the modern superhero movies, but Prometheus harkens back to an older kind of summer blockbuster that, out of necessity, relied on surprise and ingenuity. It may seem dated, but if you watch Alien now, it's still pretty fantastic. And there's not a superhero in sight.

Some fans have complained that Comic-Con has devolved from an actual comic-book convention to a catch-all pop-culture show. But for a Hollywood glutted on pulp heroes, that could be a tonic. We need different heroes, preferably ones without oaths or rings. If the new wave of blockbusters is a sign, we may be getting them. Which could mean something yet more promising: Even if we never move beyond the superhero movie — or even if we do — there will always be plenty else worth watching.

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